The Argus Company

INTRODUCTION

In a world of ideals and optimism, in a land healing from the mortal wounds of civil war, a band of would be heroes are the only ones standing against the tide of rabid technological change and the fevered brains behind it. Will they stay the course and discover the wonders of a brave new world? Or succumb to gibbering horrors that live beneath the surface of this so thinly gilded age?

STORYPREMISE:

The premise of the story is pretty much in the introduction. Steam Age, Victorian, Wild West, etc. roleplaying. Setting is an alternate history Earth.

Point of deviation from our history is Lord Byron surviving his sickness and eventually leading the Greeks to win their independence and the subsequent conquest of the Turks. Byron, crowned king of the Greek Empire, fosters a new scientific revolution with his patronage of his daughter Ada, student of Charles Babbage, and Babbage himself. Squarely setting the computer revolution (albeit mechanical) into the early 19th Century and solely in the hands of the Greeks and their Russian Allies leaving all other powers in the dust. (all this lifted from GURPS: Steampunk and Supressed Transmission column from Steve Jackson Game’s Pyramid Magazine)

The current game year is 1875 the setting is the United States. The player characters are Americans (this allows them to be from any type of background) working for the newly minted Argus Company established to try to bring America up to par with the other world powers.

The mood depends on the player’s character idea and goals. It is a serious campaign that can have humor in it, but it is not a silly campaign. Cinematic playstyle is acceptable. Think of each session or adventure as a television episode.